Doctor Who thing of the day: sonic your teeth

I’m not joking when I say that I have given some thought to science-fiction dental issues. (And I’m not someone who has particularly suffered under our still medieval dental care. I thank fluoride in the water when I was growing up for the fact that I have been almost entirely untroubled by my teeth. But I always feel like a horse being inspected when the hygienist is scraping my teeth.) I’m sure that in the Federation, no one has to go to the dentist every six months for a cleaning: they just use a nanotech mouthwash every morning that washes away tartar and red wine stains, and they’re good to go. And I’m sure there’s a setting on the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver that vibrates away tartar without rattling one’s teeth.

Until these wonders of the future come to pass, we’ll have to make do with this new sonic screwdriver electric toothbrush. I doubt the vibrations it dispenses do anything that a nonpowered toothbrush can’t do, but still: perhaps it will inspire some little kid today to invent, in years to come, a proper futuristic way to clean our teeth.